Herbs 30-40 cm tall, perennial. Rhizomes short, horizontal. Roots long stretching. Stem solitary, dark purple, erect and weakly zigzag, slightly diverging at each node from perpendicular, weakly branched in apical portion, glabrous except for somewhat brown lanate leaf axils, distantly leafy. Basal leaves few to some; petiole ± purplish, 5-12 cm; leaf blade narrowly elliptic, 4-14 × 1-3 cm, base cuneate, margin inconspicuously mucronulately sinuate-dentate, apex acuminate. Stem leaves usually 5-7; petiole 1-9 cm, shorter upward; leaf blade narrowly elliptic to lanceolate but uppermost ones narrowly lanceolate, otherwise like basal leaves, abaxially somewhat tinged purplish. Synflorescence of 1 to few short branchlets subtended by upper stem leaves, each with 1-3 capitula. Capitula with usually 15-20 florets. Involucre green and tinged purple, 1.1-1.3 cm. Phyllaries with apex obtuse to acute; outer phyllaries triangular-ovate to lanceolate, longest ca. 5 mm, margin ± ciliate; inner phyllaries usually 9-12, apically ciliate. Florets bluish purple. Achene not seen when mature. Pappus 7-8 mm. Fl. Jun-Aug. 2n = 34*.
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